As reported by AppleInsider, Sega is about to pull support for nine of its classic iPhone games, including “Sonic the Hedgehog 4,” “Golden Axe,” and “Streets of Rage.” However, the titles can still be downloaded and played for free until they are removed from the App Store.
Sega began offering free but ad-supported versions of some of its classic games on the iPhone back in 2017. Now, those games have all been made totally free but now include a warning about support soon coming to an end. The notices do not specify when support will end for the games.
“Support for this game will be discontinued, but you can continue playing offline!” says the warning, which is displayed when you start any of the games.
CNET, reports that the games that are displaying the warning are these nine:
- Crazy Taxi Classic
- Golden Axe Classics
- Shining Force Classics
- Sonic CD Classic
- Sonic the Hedgehog 4 Ep. II
- Streets of Rage Classic
- Streets of Rage 2 Classic
- Super Monkey Ball: Sakura
- Virtua Tennis Challenge
If you grab the games now, you should be able to download them from the App Store, even after they’re no longer listed in the store. The games should remain on your devices even after they’ve been removed from the App Store.
While Sega had initially offered ad-supported games that also offered an in-app purchase to remove ads, in 2019 it was announced that the Japanese video game maker would develop games for the service. Sega has focuse on supplying games to Apple Arcade ever since.
